


Sink or Swim

by Aieika



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Attempt at Humor, Crossdressing, Ereri Secret Santa 2015, M/M, Titanic!AU, jack!eren, rose!Levi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-24
Updated: 2015-12-24
Packaged: 2018-05-08 23:40:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5517431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aieika/pseuds/Aieika
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erwin Smith, found his fiance odd. She was a sour faced young lady with oddly bright red hair, and rather peculiarly broad shoulders.  Personally he thought her more handsome then pretty, but that was neither here nor there. They were betrothed thanks to an agreement that had come across their families. Rose was odd for a woman of standing as she had a foul temper and a fouler sense of humor.</p>
<p>Eren Jeager, a young man of no social standing, was about to have one of the strangest and most dangerous adventures of his life.... involving a sinking ship, and a heist involving an old lady's bedroom.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sink or Swim

**Author's Note:**

> This is my Secret Santa gift to ackxrmans! She wanted a titanic AU with Levi as Rose and Eren as Jack, so here is my attempt! It is an attempt at humor that I don't think I got. Here is part 1, part 2 will be here shortly!  
> (btw there is no cheating in this fic, nor is Erwin the bad guy. Erwin and Rose are "engaged" the quotation marks are important)
> 
> Merry Christmas!

The wind was gentle, caring the sharp scent of rotten fish with a soft undertone of salt across the port. Any other day, Eren would have thrown his head back and relished the smell that always leads to adventure. Instead, he was running as fast as he could so that his latest adventure wouldn’t sail out from under him. 

Mikasa led the way, people moving out of the way as she ploughed a path straight through the crowd. Eren held on to Armin’s thin wrist insuring that he both kept up and didn’t get separated from the two of them as he trailed behind them. They barely made it to the plank for boarding. 

Eren thrust the three tickets towards the man, who looked at them all two slowly as the ship that they were supposed to be boarding was already starting to be tugged away from the dock.

“Have you been through the lice check?” The man asked with his nose twisted up in disgust. They were obviously poor, and the man acted like they smelled worse than the fishing boats or the nearby canneries. 

Before Eren could open his mouth and make a decidedly smart-ass comment, Armin pushed in front of him and very quickly and very sweetly lied using his large blue eyes, and his vast intellect to tell the man exactly what he needed to hear. Before the man really knew what was happening the three of them were on the ship and closing the door behind them. 

Armin had won the tickets by hustling some men into trying to arm-wrestle Mikasa. No one beat Mikasa at arm wrestling, but the men hadn’t known that. All they saw was some petite foreign girl, who looked pretty bored with the whole ordeal. They had tried to start a fight by threatening Armin, which is when Eren had punched one of them in the face. This of course caused Mikasa to enter the fight, and soon the whole bar was in chaos. Armin got them all out, with the tickets, and they had just barely made it aboard. 

They all laughed (well Mikasa smiled in a pleased sort of way) and began to try and find their quarters. Armin began rattling off all of the things he knew about the Titanic. It was a modern marvel and they were aboard it for her maiden voyage. Armin was excited beyond words.

\-------

Five decks above the trio laughing below, servants were bringing in beautiful paintings, fine trinkets, and handsome luggage into a fine a luxurious suite. Erwin Smith, a young and handsome blonde man, had purchased the paintings and the trinkets as they had caught the interest of his fiancé. A sour faced young lady with oddly bright red hair, and rather peculiarly broad shoulders. Personally he thought her more handsome then pretty, but that was neither here nor there. They were betrothed thanks to an agreement that had come across their families. 

Rose was odd for a woman of standing as she had a foul temper and a fouler sense of humor. Rose’s uncle was oddly crooked looking, being very tall and always seeming to lean to the left or right as if he were ready to make a run in either direction. 

Their two butlers, Farlan and Isaac, were equally as odd. Well Farlan was fairly normal if not a little bit sly. Isaac, however, was pretty in a way that Rose was not, with a delicate face and a friendly and beautiful smile. His hair was also a more natural red then Rose’s, but it was greased up oddly into his hat. 

Erwin had spent most of his time with the four of them with a bemused expression on his handsome face. He was not entirely sure what to make of them, nor was he entirely sure why his parents thought it was a good idea to arrange a marriage with the young woman. Rose was in no way a particularly good way to raise the Smith family up in social status. Erwin guessed that his family feared that he was of a more… queer persuasion, and wanted to make sure he was good and married to prevent any sort of scandal. Honestly Erwin didn’t particularly care for any of that sort of thing queer or otherwise, which he supposed made him… queer. Long and short of the matter was that his own preferences didn’t matter, his parents were always going to choose his bride, and they had rushed the matter when rumors started trickling about. Erwin was resigned to his fate.

That evening found Erwin, Rose, and Kenny seated around a table at dinner with the Ship’s owner, Mr. Nile Dawk, and the Ship’s architect, Hange Zoe. Nile Dawk was proud and traditional. Rose had taken the first interest that Erwin had ever seen her take in much of anything (besides some very expensive tea sets) as she listened to Hange Zoe talk about the Titanic. Hange was insisting that the propellers were a work of modern marvel and that anyone would want to see them in action. The experiments that they had done to make them of the highest efficiency had been long and expensive, much to Dawk’s chagrin. Dawk thought that engineering and propellers were not suitable conversation for a lady to be involved in. 

Erwin was certain that Rose had said that Dawk was “an unsuitable shit-stain” under her breath, but Erwin didn’t ask and Dawk continued talking about women and how they were basically worthless for anything but looking pretty, (implying that Rose was not meeting that particular requirement) and eventually Rose stood up saying that she was going to turn in early. Erwin didn’t miss her eye roll as she stalked out of the dining hall.

“Women, always tiring so easily!” Dawk stated as if it proved all of his points.

\-------------

Eren had found a nice bench outside to stargaze near the aft of the ship. They were so clear and beautiful this far out to sea. Eren wanted to reach up and have to sky lift him up so that he might touch the stars. He doubted anything so romantic would ever happen to him. 

His musings were interrupted when a figure in a gaudy red dress and gaudier red hair-do stormed passed muttering all sorts of nasty things under their breath. Sitting up to watch, he saw them approach the railing at the tail-end of the ship and lean into it. Eren stood up to go see what the problem was, and he approached cautiously so not to frighten them, like he would an animal. Their shoulders began to lose some of their tension and the red-headed lady started to lean over the railing as if looking for something. Maybe she had dropped one of her jewels? Eren figured that it would be safe to talk to her now so he opened his mouth and said in what he hoped was a friendly manner, “Nice evening isn’t it?!?” 

Now Eren probably should have said that both farther back and much more quietly. As it was, the red head jerked violently, tripped over her skirts, and must have been really top heavy because suddenly she was going over the railing with a loud “FUUUUUCCCCKKKK!”

She also had some serious upper body strength because they caught the last rail with the tips of her fingers. The red-hair, however, was not held on so strongly and fell into the ocean below revealing silky black hair styled in a decidedly masculine undercut. The person got a better hold of the rail with one hand and Eren, who was leaning over the rail to help them up, managed to grab ahold of the other. Together they worked up the rail until Eren was able to heave them over the rail falling backwards with them on top of him. 

“Some fucking modern marvels,” Eren heard the person on top of him mutter which Eren did not entirely understand. And now that the adrenaline was wearing off, Eren was realizing that although this person was significantly shorter then him, they were also extremely heavy. 

In the distance they heard shouting and running footsteps that were getting closer and closer and the black-haired person’s hand went reflectively to his head. Their eyes widened. “Shit!” They said. Eren didn’t think, simply pulled the person up with him and grabbed their hand and pulled.

“Come on!” Eren whispered urgently realizing that if this person was found in such a state bad things would happen as they did to people who were revealed to have not been born as the gender that they were dressed as. 

Eren shoved the person behind a wall and ran back and flung himself down onto the deck near the rail, rubbing his head as if he had just hit it. He explained to the men that had finally managed to get to him that he had slipped on the deck and had fallen. After a while of insisting that he was fine he went back to the other’s hiding place. 

They looked fairly panicked. 

Eren sat down and said cautiously and much quieter, “So… What’s your name?”

The black haired person glanced at him and then said, “Levi.”

“So, Levi, is there anything I can do to help?” Eren asked hopefully.

Levi snorted, “No, I lost my wig, no way to maintain my cover.”

“Your cover?” Eren didn’t quite understand. 

Levi looked at Eren and then shrugged. “No use hiding it anymore. Not to you at least, since you’ve seen me. I’m currently working in disguise, theirs this man that I’m-.”

“You’re working in disguise for a man? On wha- OH! Are you… you know… someone that does things with other men for money?”

Levi opened his mouth to protest but Eren realizing that he probably just put his foot in his mouth started rambling, “not that I think there is any shame in that! People do work of all sorts and I don’t really think that a person’s work, even sex work, is a negative reflection on a person. I mean, I like sex, and I’m sure people get some pretty different tastes, and your pretty handsome so if you are getting paid to maintain some sort of fantasy I mean that’s not something to be ashamed of!” 

Levi rolled his eyes and snapped, “shut-up!”

Eren snapped his mouth closed and waited for Levi to say more.

“Look, I’m glad you think that kind of work is okay. However, that isn’t the sort of business I’m in. My Uncle gets these jobs and ours is to rob this Smith family blind, so he got me engaged to their son. He originally planned for Isabel to play the part, but she refused to get all dolled up and act like a pretty little princess. She said she never got to be one of the guards, and so I had to do it.”

Eren blinked, “So you are trying to commit a heist?”

“Yeah. Getting all dolled up is kind of fun, but corsets are a bitch and skirts are a tripping hazard. Stockings are nice though. The worst thing is that people treat women like they’ll break at any moment and like they aren’t smart enough to think for themselves. Anyone who knows my Issy knows that is in no way even remotely true.”

“Your Issy?” Eren pried carefully. He wanted to know as much as possible about this handsome man in the gaudy dress. Eren wasn’t easily attracted to anyone, but when he became attracted to someone he tended to get a bit stupid around them. He didn’t want to make a complete fool of himself if the man was already spoken for.

“Isabel. She’s kind of like my baby sister. Loud mouth, overly enthusiastic, and hates skirts. She’s a little spit-fire,” responded Levi, a look of fondness crossing his face.

“So in other words, you got the part of girl-betrothed… and you are up shit creek without a paddle because your wig fell off?”

“Long and short of it, yes.”

“Well, shit.”

“Took the words right out of my mouth,” the two of them just sat there, on a huge-ass ship in the middle of the freezing night, an awkward silence between them. Levi needed help but really couldn’t justify asking someone that just saved his ass from drowning to risk themselves on his behalf, and Eren wanted to help but had no idea how until-

“Madam Plumb-butt!” Eren suddenly exclaimed, looking excited. Levi thought that was a rather odd thing to shout, but he didn’t say anything. He was a man in a dress after all. You just didn’t see that every day.

Instead Levi asked, “and how will Madam Plumb-butt help?”

“Well she’s this lady who is trying to look much younger then she actually is. Poor thing is rail thin and trying to cover it up by stuffing pillows in dress both in the front and the back. She also wear’s wigs that are about the same color as your wig! I know I saw her itch under it, and every hair-do is a just so slightly different shade of red,” Eren explained.

Levi could see where this was going, but he had to ask, “why do you call her Madam Plumb-butt?”

“Because when I first saw her she was wearing this awful and old fashioned dress that made her pillow-butt look like a plumb. It’s not the nicest name I have ever come up with, but it was the first thing that popped into my mind. And it is much more flattering then Lady-with-a-huge-stick-up-her-ass-that-likes-to-knock-children-out-of-her-way-when-she-walks.”

Levi looked at Eren who looked positively excited about the prospect of breaking into an old lady’s quarters and stealing one of her wigs. He supposed that Eren didn’t think much of this Lady’s personality.

“Alright then; operation steal an old lady’s wig is on.”

**Author's Note:**

> visit me on tumblr! http://aieika.tumblr.com/


End file.
